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[Image description:
A closeup of a hand-written sticker on the back of a street sign. It says (in all caps), "While you're celebrating Christmas this weekend, his birthplace is being bombed". Underneath, it says (in cursive), "Free Palestine". In the background, which is out of focus, there are city buildings and people walking around.
End ID.]
They De-Tumblrized Ms. Frizzle
Allow me to explain:
Everyone dropping this pic
And talking about how the new frizz her is her niece, allow me to do a direct side by side instead
These are STILL not the same woman. Where is the icon fashion, the earrings (the chameleon, which might be in the new show idk I haven't watched it), the prominent hooked nose, the broader shoulders, the volume to her hair, the LIFE IN HER EYES
This frizzle looks like she's been called into the school board for inappropriate behavior and dress one too many times and has been broken.
Also others have said it before me but I couldn't find it in the scroll backs but they whitewashed all the kids too. They same face syndromed everyone to either be easier to draw or be more ambiguous so as not to offend or both or something, and it just makes me sad
Fuck it I did the digging cause I'm still mad
And that’s not even to mention what they did to the bus itself.
The old bus had a personality and life and fun and now it’s just… a bus.
HOW DO Y’ALL WHITEWASH A BUS?!
It's gives "anti abortion Jehova's Witness cartoon" now
This, I find, is an excellent example of how “aesthetic cleanliness” usually just means making something less interesting. Taking the bus and Frizz’s dresses as a relatively unproblematic, but very stupid, example first. What the showrunners have done here is seen the visuals of the original show and tried to declutter them for the tastes of modern audiences. The issue is that the taste they’re catering to is that of parents because they are generally choosing what children watch, and those parents don’t like clutter, and they see all of those fun shapes and colors as visual noise. YouTuber Tantacrul has a great video on how this effects children in music education. In short it’s why no children’s music toys have the capabilities for experimentation that normal instruments do, parents can’t stand “inharmonious sounds”
The much bigger problem here comes when this design philosophy bleeds into the character designs. What they’ve tried to do is make the show easier to look at by smoothing everything out making it all look a little more “cohesive.” Problem is that when you homogenize everything you, well… homogenize everything. Skin tones are lightened, curls are straightened, Noses are smoothed, fat kids are made skinny, it all becomes less diverse and less interesting. It paints a picture of an executive who thinks that people of color and other marginalized people won’t sell, their version of the magic school bus will be much neater, much more fitting to show our kids.
TL;DR:
Problem a) they tried to declutter the visuals to cater to modern parents who like “clean aesthetics,” without considering what will be fun for kids to watch
Problem b) in doing so they whitewashed the character designs and send the deeply insidious message that certain people don’t fit the desired aesthetic and are thus, not fit to be represented in kids tv
ALTI was asked today by a journalist if we received a response from the white house to the letter we sent from the churches in Bethlehem asking for a ceasefire. I answered that the response was the veto vote in the UN. They celebrate Christmas in their land, and wage war in our land
— Munther Isaac منذر اسحق (@MuntherIsaac) December 10, 2023
ALTMy word to the journalists who attended our church to see our manger was: We want an end to this genocide that it taking place in Gaza: pic.twitter.com/gn2j2n2zWF
— Munther Isaac منذر اسحق (@MuntherIsaac) December 11, 2023
Munther Isaac is the Pastor of Christmas Evangelical Lutheran Church Bethlehem
For the first time since the 1948 Nakba, there was no Christmas tree lighting outside the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, Palestine.
In its place, an installation depicting the nativity scene is placed as if it were taking place in Gaza today. This is done in support of the people of Gaza who have been facing a harrowing Israeli aggression for the past 80 days, an aggression so catastrophic that it lead to cancelling Christmas celebrations in Bethlehem this year.
With the nativity models placed amid rubble and barbed wire, the star of Bethlehem is represented by the aftermath of a bomb hitting their shelter. The scene replicates those following Israeli shelling of civilian homes in Gaza.
